


loose thread

by Engineer104



Series: B-I-N-G-O [2]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Bad Things Happen Bingo, Gen, Human Experimentation, Paralysis, Sort Of, ack i don't know what to tag this one, drugged, in a manner, the Green Lion is a griffin because i can do that
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-05-22
Updated: 2019-05-22
Packaged: 2020-03-09 19:41:15
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,641
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18923749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Engineer104/pseuds/Engineer104
Summary: Pidge wakes unable to move, but she fears that less than the voice absent from her head.For Bad Things Happen Bingo. Prompt:  Can Only Move the Eyes





	loose thread

**Author's Note:**

> the ~~frustrating~~ fun thing about BTB Bingo is that it's possible to put multiple prompts into one fic but alas, i'm not allowed to do that ;_;
> 
> in any case, enjoy!!

Pidge is slow to wake. Her eyelids stick together, sight bleary and clouded no matter how many times she blinks to clear it. Her first thought is how _exhausted_ she is, how she wants nothing more than to roll onto her side and slip back into a warm dream; and with it still so dark she sees nothing, she should sleep while she can.

She must've ignored Shiro's scolding and Minerva's prodding and stayed up too late again.

 _"What are you even doing while the rest of us are asleep?"_ Lance asked her once. _"Something you don't want the rest of us to see?"_

 _"Yes,"_ was her easy, clipped, _irritated_ answer that she regretted as soon as she registered the teasing that was in his voice and the scowl that rose to his lips before he bid her a terse _good night_.

It's rare Pidge wakes without someone - her mother, once upon a time, and Minerva more often lately with a nudge to her mind - waking her, so it's a wonder she still needs sleep. Her eyes slip shut again as a sigh escapes her, and she raises her hands to stretch.

Or she tries to.

Her arms refuse to obey her; she can't even lift them off the thin mattress, and when she tries to raise her head or shift her shoulders to shrug off the quilt, she can't do that either.

"W--"

Her heart skips a beat at the sound of her own pathetic whimper. Why can't she even move her lips to speak, to demand of her own body why it won't do as she asks it?

Her feet and legs are as rigid as her hands and arms, utterly useless and disconnected from her will, and it doesn't take long for Pidge to come to the conclusion that she can't move _anything_.

Her whole body is sticky with sweat under the quilt, her clothes uncomfortable against her skin. She tries - desperately, so desperate sweat beads along her forehead with the effort - to wiggle, if only a little, but a wordless, frustrated sob slips from her when she can't.

Panic grips her, and it's all Pidge can do to breathe. Her lungs ache, heaving in shallow bursts of air while her heart pounds wildly. Oh, God, what's happening to her? Where is she? Is this even her room at the Castle? She can barely see anything, it's so dark, it's--

It's a blindfold, she realizes. A strip of cloth covers her eyes - and how--how could she not have noticed _that_?

Where--where's everyone else, all her friends and Matt? Shiro, Lance, Hunk...

Minerva!

Frantically she reaches out to her - why did she not sooner? - seeking for that invisible bond and tugging with all her mental strength and--

It stretches beyond her view. No matter how much she tugs, it refuses to tauten, so Pidge is left pulling an endless thread that connects nowhere.

 _No, no, no!_ Pidge seeks Minerva as she would any thought that slipped from her grasp, sifting through her mind; it's like misplacing her brother's glasses or her journal, but so much _worse_.

Hot tears prick at her eyes and bile rises into her throat. _Minerva,_ she thinks, desperate, _where are you?_

Her faithful and impossible friend, her closest companion, the griffin she raised from an egg...she wouldn't just ignore Pidge's pleas, would she?

Unless she fell victim to poachers.

A new fear creeps into Pidge; her stomach roils with nausea. Minerva came to her rescue more times than she could count - her friends' griffins came to theirs, always quick and fierce when protecting their flock - but now she needs _Pidge_.

 _"Fledgling,"_ Minerva called Pidge, always full of fondness and occasionally with a touch of exasperation.

 _"Why do you call me that?"_ Pidge wondered once.

 _"Young and flightless,"_ Minerva replied in her simple diction. How far she'd come from when she could only communicate in memories and images...

Pidge snorted and said, _"I'm practically your mother!"_

 _"Flightless!"_ Minerva insisted with a click of her beak. She nuzzled Pidge's hair, making her giggle, and added, _"Need rescue from predators. Hatchling?"_

_"If you call me 'hatchling' I'm never bringing you wool to play with again."_

Minerva screeched indignantly as Pidge laughed.

Pidge is as useless and helpless as a hatchling griffin now; the quilt covering her - barely keeping her warm in this drafty room - may as well be a chain winding around her body for all the success she's had throwing it off.

And she doesn't even know where she is or how she came to be here.

Pidge probes her mind - it's the only weapon left to her - and her memory. She remembers...something. She and Keith sneaking into a village for supplies while their griffins hid in the trees; Pidge insisting Keith go ahead without her when she overheard someone saying her father's name; assailing the speaker, a stately woman with a beauty mark walking alongside a shorter, bespectacled man; the two taking Pidge into a tavern for a drink and a chat...

Pidge swaying on her feet as she left them and Minerva's wings spread wide and blotting out the sun before it all went black.

They drugged her, Pidge realizes, and somehow they took Minerva from her too.

She'd cry, sob, and scream if she could, for the tightness in her chest and the fear in her gut. What _now_? Is she just to lie here and wait until the drug wears off - what if its effects are _permanent_? - or until her captors deign to pay her a visit?

A muffled creaking of rusty hinges makes her breath catch, and a heartbeat later heavy footsteps approach. A voice buzzes, but Pidge's ears are so full of cotton she barely understands.

Rough fingers tug on her head and untie the blindfold. An intense light - too bright and pinpoint to be natural - blinds her, and she has to blink tears from her eyes.

The intruder sets aside the light. Their face, too blurry for Pidge to make out any features, hovers over her, but this time she hears a deep, feminine voice, "...sure you...questions."

Pidge thinks she can guess the missing words. An awful anger - for Minerva, for herself - that would twist her lips and make her spit insults were she able fills her, and she glares up at the indistinct face.

She hopes they can see the hatred in her eyes.

The figure crosses their arms. "My...Commander Hira...Altean... - or I _was_." They laugh bitterly, and the mattress sinks beneath Pidge as they take a seat. "We are both fugitives...the Empire, are we not?"

Pidge blinks furiously, forcing her eyes to focus; the woman's - Commander Hira's? And she's an _Altean_? - words are becoming easier to distinguish, and her face blurs less until she can make out a pair of gleaming, metallic blue markings on her cheeks and pointed, elfin ears.

Pidge thought all Alteans died out - killed by the Galra - generations ago...does this mean some _live_?

It doesn't matter; she _has_ to escape somehow, but her body is as unresponsive as ever.

Pidge wants to demand what this Commander Hira wants of her. She wants answers about her whereabouts, about her condition, about _Minerva_ , but she can't ask for anything.

And her impotence infuriates her.

"I apologize for drugging you, Lady Green," Commander Hira says with a heavy sigh. "I am afraid it was necessary for your sake - and your Gift's sake - as well as mine and my men's."

Why did she call Pidge _Lady Green_? And why did she say "gift" as if it was a proper noun?

"You see"--Hira stands and paces around the round, stone-walled room with her hands folded behind her back--"we simply cannot have an angry griffin rampaging for its rider while we conduct our study, so until we find an alternative, you and your Gift must remain drugged."

 _Minerva_ is her "Gift"? And... _study_?

"Now, I heard tell that the Green Guardian favors those with curiosity and intellect," Hira explains, "so I see no harm in sharing some details of the study with you, captive subject or not."

Can it be? Her captor wishes to hand her information so easily?

Far be Pidge the one to protest.

Hira stops at the end of the cot. "You may have noticed that your little...connection to your Gift is a rare thing," she says. "The like of it is mythical and its nature a mystery, and so my lieutenant and I are eager to study it. You said your father is Sam Holt, Lady Green; is he not a naturalist?"

A sick feeling takes hold of her, her heart squeezing in her chest. She has an awful idea what Hira's study entails - oh, how she regrets parting from Keith and approaching her!

"Then you of all people will understand what we seek to accomplish." Hira leans over Pidge and takes her chin in hand, the touch making her skin crawl. "We wish to replicate this bond you and your Gift have forged," she says, "and we will weaponize it to exterminate the Galra and take back Altea."

Wait, then did that mean--

"Do not fear for your Gift's life," Hira tells her, her thumb stroking Pidge's cheek as gently as her own mother would and her gaze holding hers. "It is a rare creature, but you..." Her fingernails dig into her skin so sharply and suddenly she gasps. "To forge a new bond, we must break the existing one, and if it cannot be done through other means, then I am afraid you will be this study's first casualty."

Pidge's blood runs cold with understanding. Hira will take Minerva away from her and force someone else on her. She'll kill Pidge without remorse...and she won't even have the chance to scream.


End file.
